Movie Review: Unhinged

Unhinged ** ½ / *****
Directed by: Derrick Borte.
Written by: Carl Ellsworth.
Starring: Russell Crowe (The Man), Caren Pistorius (Rachel), Jimmi Simpson (Andy), Gabriel Bateman (Kyle), Anne Leighton (Deborah Haskell), Lucy Faust (Rosie), Austin P. McKenzie (Fred), Michael Papajohn (Cop), Sylvia Grace Crim (Teacher), Stephen Louis Grush (Leo), Juliene Joyner (Mary).

Yes, I went to the movie theatre for the first time since March when I saw First Cow less than week before theatres closed due to Covid-19 pandemic. I didn’t go because I felt some unrelenting need to see Russell Crowe play a road-raging psycho – I went because I know I will be going to see Tenet when it opens next week, and I wanted to go on a dry run to see what it’s like. I should point out that I live in Canada – where the virus, while certainly still around, isn’t as bad as it is in America – and in an area where we currently only have four active cases, and only about 150 during the entire pandemic. I purposefully chose the last show of the day – a 10:30 PM show, which was just 15 minutes after the second last show of Unhinged of the day (which according to the seating chart online had a few more people in it than mine did) – I showed up at 10:28, hands freshly sanitized, wearing a mask, and was relieved to find that I was the only person in that screening. I didn’t buy concessions, I sanitized my hands again when I got to my reserved seat, and never once took my mask off. Movie going during a pandemic will never be completely safe – nothing except staying home will be – but I also know that if no one goes to the movies, staying as safe as humanly possible during the pandemic, no one will be able to go after the pandemic is over. I won’t fault anyone who doesn’t feel safe going, and passes – but if the experience is much like what I had tonight, I will continue to do so.

The movie both is and isn’t the ideal one to resume my movie going life with – it isn’t, because unlike when it looked like my last theatrical experience would be First Cow, I cannot say that at least I went out watching a great film. But it is, because I was nervous enough about going that I didn’t actually make my final decision until I was on my way out the door – so at least the film was completely unchallenging, and didn’t require my full attention. Unhinged is the type of film you may expect to go straight to streaming – a kind of paycheque movie for a great actor like Crowe (seriously, why is an actor who at one point looked to be one of the greats of generation with performances like L.A. Confidential, The Insider, etc. doing this movie?). It’s a cheapie thriller, where Crowe plays a psychopath – and you know he’s a psychopath from the first scene, where we see him break into his former house, kill his wife and new boyfriend/husband (not sure, it’s seen in long shot so you don’t get details), set the house on fire and then speed away in his pickup truck. His innocent target is Rachel (Caren Pistorius) a woman going through a divorce of her own, with a pre-teen son, a slacker brother and his girlfriend living at her house, and money problems. She gets frustrated driving her son to school – they are late, again – and honks at the wrong pickup when he doesn’t go through when the light turns green. That, of course, is Crowe – who pulls alongside her at the next light, and chastises her. Yes, he zoned out at that light, but she could have at least given her a courtesy tap right. He apologizes, and says if she does the same, they can just go on their own separate ways. She refuses – thus setting up the rest of the movie, where he is determined to make sure she knows what a bad day really is.

Crowe is clearly over-qualified for the role – but that doesn’t mean he doesn’t give it his all. He is an imposing physical presence – a huge, bulking man whose days of being the lean and muscular man we saw in Gladiator is decades in the past. He effects a drawl on his speech, which is all the scarier because of how calmly he uses it. That goes for most his actions as well – no matter how violent, he does it all with a cruel, casualness of someone who knows that he’ll prevail. He knows his days are numbered – they’re already looking for him because of the double murder – and suicide by cop sounds okay to him. Until then though, he’s going to continue to commit as much violence as humanly possible.

I kept hoping that the movie may try to go a little deeper than it does. There are certainly hints of the roots of Crowe’s rage here – he spews vitriol that sounds like it could come out of the mouth of a Men’s Rights Activist, and a news report gives a few background tidbits that make him sound like one Trump’s forgotten Americans that he exploits while not given a shit about them. But the film doesn’t seem overly interested in any of it rather than as background noise. It wants to be a straight ahead thriller – a cat and mouse game. I will say that the film doesn’t really pull any punches in terms of the violence – it’s pretty hard edged, but doesn’t dwell on it – it’s shock and awe tactics are pretty effective. The plotting of the movie is obvious – we see has things are introduced casually in the first act – a pair of scissors, a strategy for Fortnite, etc. that will become key in the last act.

In short, Unhinged a cheapie thriller – made to make a quick buck for Crowe, and all involved. It’s from an upstart distributor, who really wanted to be the first wide release movie to come out after the pandemic – a way to perhaps get more attention, eyeballs and money than it otherwise would get. I will likely never forget Tenet, as it was my first movie back in theatres after my longest layoff in 25 years – and with any luck, the longest layoff I will ever have. It will have little to do with the movie itself however.